


An Avid Collector

by KJGooding



Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Baseball, Gen, Tennis, nerds
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-24
Updated: 2019-03-24
Packaged: 2019-12-07 01:45:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,032
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18228230
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KJGooding/pseuds/KJGooding
Summary: Commander Sisko sees something of himself in the young CMO, and enjoys teasing him.  It turns out they have an interest in sport in common.





	An Avid Collector

 

This is going to be the first of many long nights, Julian can tell from the moment he steps into the office and sees that lopsided smile on his commander’s face.It isn’t enough for Julian to be the primary physician for the station’s entire complement; no, he has engineering credits and recent command training courses to his name, so Commander Sisko has assigned him the task of managing crew performance reports. They’re entirely automated, collecting biometrics any time a crewman signs in at their console, but someone needs to babysit the main station computer, to ensure they are sent in consistent batches to Starfleet command. It sounds rather like something a station commander should do, but Julian keeps this to himself as he takes the seat across the desk from Sisko.

They’ve only been aboard DS9 for a few weeks, and Sisko is slow to unpack. There’s a box directly in front of Sisko’s computer screen, making the distance between his eyes and Julian’s seem insurmountable. Without anything but this distance to go on, Julian feels like he’s about to be given a lecture.

But then Sisko opens his desk drawer, forcing a sense of casual, last-minute camaraderie into the space between them, and Julian leans in close to study the item Sisko is removing.

He thinks he recognizes it... it’s certainly the right shape and size, although the colors aren’t quite right...

“Is that... do you play tennis, Sir?” Julian asks, while Sisko’s hand is still partially obscured behind the monitor.

“Hmm?” Sisko chuckles to himself, and rolls the ball into his other hand, holding it in the tips of his fingers so Julian can see it properly.

“Oh, um—“ Julian starts.

“Baseball, actually.I’ve followed the sport my whole life.”

Julian has another thought he wisely keeps to himself, about the sport being ‘positively ancient.’

“You don’t follow it, do you, Doctor?”

Julian brings one of his hands to the table, wondering if he has time to touch his chin, get an estimate of his facial expression.Does he look too invested? Is he about to disappoint his commanding officer over a triviality, before they even get to discussing business? Oh, he hates smalltalk.

“N-no, I can’t say I do. Actually, I go more for ten—“

“Tennis, Doctor?” Sisko says, with a little glimmer in the corner of his eye.

Julian knows he’s done something... not wrong, but unusual enough to get Sisko’s attention. He clears his throat and starts to ask about the personnel reports; Sisko cuts him off.

“I have jerseys, almanacs, trading cards...” Sisko says.

Julian flinches, and stares down at the desk. Sisko laughs again, quiet and restrained, hard for Julian to place. But his fear is put to bed in an instant, with a horrible monster under the bed-frame.

Sisko takes another souvenir from inside the drawer. It is one of the trading cards, with the Federation insignia on the back. That faces Julian, and Julian can guess what picture is facing Sisko...

“From what I understand, Doctor, you had an incredible sophomore season.”

Julian frowns, then smiles, then frowns again. It’s always nice to recognized, but he’s fairly sure Sisko is messing with him. Or he might genuinely appreciate good sportsmanship, encourage athleticism in his junior officers, or...?

“I didn’t know any of those were still in circulation, Sir. It, er... it came as a replicator pattern with one issue of the Academy Circular.”

“That explains the difficulty I had in tracking it down,” Sisko says.

Slowly, Sisko turns the card over, holding the corner safely between his thumb and index finger. He fans it several times through the air, while Julian looks on helplessly.

Julian stares into a small, printed image of himself... In his academy uniform, leaning a racquet between his wrist and his shoulder, a coaxed-just-shy-of-overconfident smile on his face. The image was only captured a few years ago, but Julian can see what the other officers meant, when they dismissively discussed his age.

“Yes, that’s... is the phrase ‘in mint condition?’”

“Mm. But then it isn’t very old, is it? It was a gift from a friend, one of the piloting instructors. I didn’t seek it out myself. I didn’t know it existed, until word got back to the Academy about my crew roster.”

“...yes, Sir...?” Julian says, a little unsure.

Sisko pinches the upper corner of the card, now, taking away his thumb from the lower one. The newly uncovered space is blank, beneath a typed summary of Julian’s sophomore game stats. He closes his eyes, and Sisko interrupts the prayer Julian does not know how to start, anyway.

“As far as I know, there aren’t any autographed copies,” Sisko says, raising one eyebrow to finish the request.

He sets it on the desk, slides it closer to Julian, one excruciating millimeter at a time. Next comes the pen, silver and fine, also from Sisko’s drawer.

“That’s right, Sir,” Julian says, sheepishly taking the pen. “I’d say the majority of my classmates didn’t... well, they didn’t... want to hear it...?”

“Hear what?” Sisko asks kindly, nudging the pen against Julian’s knuckles.

Julian laughs and relents, and takes up the pen. He clicks back the cap of it and sets it to the paper, testing the strength of the ink. He hasn’t used a traditional pen like this in ages.

“Hear that I was breaking records outside of the classroom,” Julian says, blushing and knowing he can’t hide behind the card, flat on the table, now dusted with attention-grabbing metallic ink. “Is there a more humble way to say that?”

“I wouldn’t be as thrilled to have you on my crew if there were, Doctor,” Sisko assures.

Julian finishes his name with a flourish, then gives the whole card a dry laugh, as he picks it up and waves it in the air until it dries. Then he gives it back to Sisko, and keeps quiet.

“Oh, it’s staying in the drawer, Doctor,” Sisko adds. “I have a binder full of them. A century of baseball legends.”

“And me,” Julian shrugs.

“And you. Now... about those personnel reports...”

”You don’t make any exceptions for star athletes?” 

“I’m afraid not.”


End file.
